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Celestial Machinery
Erwt is the back of a vast cosmic clock. This clock is just one of many celestial devices, which work in concert to run the universe. The ultimate purpose of the cosmic engineers is not known. The celestial machines are analogous planets, except there's no gravity so they're not orbiting anything in particular. Objects in the cosmos are interconnected. The filaments and fibers and all that which connects all things to the cosmic machinery (and which connect cosmic machines to each other) are not physical objects, so they don't get tangled, don't take up space, and can pass through solid objects without any issues. Example If you put together bread and ham to make a sandwich, at some level your action results in the Spinning Wheel twining of some threads connected to the bread and some threads connected to the ham and some threads from the Clock and some other stuff, including some threads connecting to you (as the sandwich maker) and that's wound together to a new thread. That thread combines concepts about ham and bread and sandwich and you and when the making happened, and all of that. In a sense, though, you could consider the Spinning Wheel as the cause, and the sandwich-making as the result, because they're one and the same. A new entry for this sandwich is made in the Ledger. If you were to eat it absentmindedly and forget you ever made the sandwich over the next couple of days, and you eventually excrete it and everything about the sandwich essentially becomes meaningless, the sandwich loses value in all the Auctions, it ends up in the Dustbin, and is eventually ground up to constituent "stuff" in the Mill. The Clock Three great hands dominate the circular clock face. The thinnest moves swiftly, 60 revolutions for every revolution of the middle hand, which turns 60 revolutions for every revolution of the most massive hand. Scattered across the clock face, passing underneath the main hands, are smaller dials. These rotate at varying speeds, sometimes changing direction. Even more are visible around the perimeter of the main clock face. One particular dial is slowly winding down to zero. Streaming from around the clock face are great bundles of shimmering filaments, creating a baroque effect. Each filament pulses with the ticking of the clock, binding the dimension T of every aspect of every thing in the cosmos to this massive, central clock. The Spinning Wheel More closely resembling a lunatic assembly of drums, spindles, wheels, gears, spools, and pulleys, the Spinning Wheel spins together fibers of being into Threads of Identity. For example, "you" are the composite of all the things you do, touch, think, and say, and the Spinning Wheel is the cosmic device that handles the wrapping up of separate fiberstuffs into cohesive threads, each of which are an object, concept, or person with a separate identity. Some of the fibers feeding into the Wheel are the filaments of timestuff from the Clock. Most of the fibers come from elsewhere - associations, events, values, aspects from physical-logical locations and from other Celestial Machines. The Loom The Loom is as wide as the Cosmos, and stretches across the night sky as a great, pale structure. It weaves together the Threads supplied by the Spinning Wheel into the Fabric of Reality. The Mill The Mill grinds up unused stuff, changing it from something with possible structure and meaning, into formless material that can be reused elsewhere. Two great aetherial stones turn endlessly against one another, stuff fed into a chute just off from the rotational axis, and dust spilling out around the sides. The Ledger It's structurally an enormous book, but it's accessed (or navigated) more like a library. The Ledger keeps track of everything in the universe. If something is inconsequential, then the Ledger marks it off, and it's sent to the Dustbin. That is, if something doesn't connect with enough other fibers to end up in a thread, or if the thread is short or feeble, or if a patch of weave becomes old and patchy, its entry is struck from the Ledger and it ceases to be an active part of the universe. The Dustbin Lost & Found, recycling bin, trash can, and ash tray all at the same time. When the Mill runs out of stuff to grind, this is where it gets more. The Dustbin might just be a special, somewhat neglected room in the Auction House, or it could be a separate machine that's nearby. The Auction House The Auction House is a vast architecture of rooms and halls connected by causeways, trapdoors, gates, narrow passages, winding stairs, chutes, hallways, and plain doors. In the House, stuff is evaluated. Stuff that has a high likelihood of sticking around gets a higher value than other stuff. Values are noted in the Ledger. Value isn't single-dimensional; there are multiple currencies and valuations. Auctions are held continuously, in multiple rooms and halls, and stuff is shuffled around room to room as it's bought and sold. There are currencies like "Justice", "Evil", and "Fame". Some of these currencies relate directly to Alchemical Forms: for example, there's an auction room where things are dealt in "Sharpness", and events there echo (or mirror) events on Erwt, where a lumberjack dulls his axe on a stone, or an alchemist drinks an elixir of Hawkseye and Pins. It is unknown if there are actual living cosmic agents at work here, or if it's an autonomous system, but that is not a particularly important question, since it doesn't affect how the Auction House operates. The Power House It shines white light and supplies energy to everything. Ordinary energy like that of motion, heat, light, as well as more abstract energies, such as vitality, life, zest, clarity, and so on. The Mechanism A complex mechanical device that is the physics (both aetherial and conventional) of the cosmos (including Erwt). It is recursive in nature, in that it describes or enforces the very rules of nature which determine its operation. It resolves the calculus of motion and the interaction of objects, and also cause and effect. While it's tied closely to the Clock and its operation, the Mechanism is a separate and distinct piece of celestial machinery. The Dancers These are a cluster of lights, constantly in motion. Only a dozen or so are visible to the naked eye, but fuzzy luminescence towards the center of the cluster hints at an uncountable number of dimmer lights. Moderate telescopes reveal there are at least several thousands of distinct lights, and some astronomers believe the number ranges in the millions. Unknown to the inhabitants of Erwt (the back side of the Clock), these are the worlds for which the Cosmos was originally designed and created, and it is there the gods who built the Cosmos spend their time and attention. Category:Cosmology